GoCardless launches open banking payments, with Cuckoo as customer No.1

Open banking payments are getting ever more competitive, with the arrival of GoCardless as the latest provider today offering the service.

After announcing its intention to break into the open banking space last year, GoCardless just launched one-off bank-to-bank payments for its customers.

For GoCardless’s 60,000 merchant customers who use its direct debit service, the new feature offers a unique alternative for them to handle single non-recurring payments.

“We’ve specialised in bank-to-bank payments for over 10 years, with bank debit as the primary payment method. And while it provides many advantages to consumers and businesses, speed of payment authorisation is a drawback,” said Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO and co-founder of GoCardless.

“Instant Bank Pay addresses this by giving merchants the best of both worlds: open banking will provide instant confirmation of payment authorisation, enabling them to have immediate visibility of their one-off payments, and bank debit will continue to offer the cash flow, cost and retention benefits they have come to expect.”

It’s a big change for GoCardless, which until now has only operated in the ‘card on file’ market with direct debits.

The fintech marked the launch with news that challenger broadband provider Cuckoo, which raised a $6m funding round only yesterday, is the first customer to roll the service out after a period of early access to the tech.

Cuckoo said it used GoCardless Instant Bank Pay to deal with customers’ whose first payments failed, with two-thirds of them being able to resolve the matter with an open banking payment quickly.

“Not only will it prevent our customers from losing access to our services, it’ll also help reduce the time we spend chasing late-payments and the risk of costs outstanding,” said Cuckoo founder and CEO Alexander Fitzgerald.